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there is in reality not so much exaggeration in their description, as alteration in our manners.-For if the peasants were allowed to enjoy the fruits of their own labour, would not their lives be more delightful than those of any other people ?-In spite of poverty and oppression, a hapру enthusiasm, a charming madness, and perfect oblivion of care, are diffused all over France during the vintage.Every village is enlivened with music, dancing, and glee; and were it not for their tattered clothes and emaciated countenances, one who viewed them in the vintage season, would imagine the country people of France in a situation as enviable as that which, according to the poets, was formerly enjoyed by the shepherds of Arcadia. The peasantry of this country have not so great a sensibility or expression of joy; and though blessed with health, freedom, and abundance, a composed satisfaction, a kind of phlegmatic good-humour, mark the boundaries of their happiness.

When we arrived at Basil, we went directly to the Three Kings. This inn, in point of situation, is the most agreeable you can well imagine. The Rhone washes its walls, and the windows of a large dining-room look across that noble river to the fertile plains on the opposite side.

I am just returned from that same dining-room, where Harvey and I thought proper to sup.-There were ten or a dozen people at table. I sat next to a genteel-looking man from Strasbourg, with whom I conversed a good deal during supper. He had for his companion a round faced, rosy, plump gentleman, from Amsterdam, who did not speak French: but the Strasbourger addressed him from time to time in Low Dutch, to which the other replied by nods.

When the retreat of the greater part of the company had contracted the little circle which remained, I expressed some regret to my Strasbourg acquaintance, that Mr. Harvey and I could not speak a little Dutch; or that his friend could not speak French, that we might enjoy the

pleasure of his conversation. This was immediately translated to the Dutchman, who heard it with great composure, and then took his pipe from his mouth, and made an answer, which I got our interpreter, with some difficulty, to explain. It was to this effect. That we ought to console ourselves for the accident of our not understanding each other; for as we had no connection, or dealings in trade together, our conversing could not possibly answer any useful purpose. Harvey made a low bow to this compliment, saying, that the justness and good sense of that remark had certainly escaped my observation, as he ac. knowledged it had hitherto done his.

A man that travels, you see, my friend, and takes care to get into good company, is always learning something. Had I not visited the Three Kings at Basil, I might have conversed all my lifetime without knowing the true use of language.

LETTER XXXVIII.

Basil.

THER HERE has been an interval of three days since I had the conversation with my ingenious acquaintance from Amsterdam. We are assured that the chaise, which has been accommodated with a new axletree, will be ready this afternoon. In the interim, I shall write you a few remarks on this town.

Basil is larger than any town in Switzerland, but not so populous for its size as Geneva. The inhabitants seem to be uncommonly afraid of thieves, most of the windows being guarded by iron bars or grates, like those of convents or prisons.

I observed at the lower end of many windows a kind of wooden box, projecting towards the street, with a round glass, of about half a foot diameter, in the middle. I was told this was for the conveniency of people within; who, without being seen, choose to sit at the windows, and a

muse themselves by looking at the passengers ;-that they were mostly occupied by the ladies, who are taught to think it indecent to appear at the windows,

The inhabitants of Basil seem to be of a reserved and saturnine disposition; whether it is natural or affected I cannot tell, but the few I conversed with, had something uncommonly serious and formal in their manner. How an unremitting gravity and solemnity of manner, in the common affairs of life, comes to be considered as an indication of wisdom, or of extraordinary parts, is what I never could understand.-So many ridiculous things occur every day in this world, that men, who are endowed with that degree of sensibility which usually accompanies genius, find it very difficult to maintain a continued gravity. This difficulty is abundantly felt even in the grave and learned professions of law, physic, and divinity; and the individuals who have been most successful in surmounting it, and who never deviate from the solemnity of established forms, have not been always the most distinguished for real knowledge or genius; though they generally are most admired by the multitude, who are very apt to mistake that gravity for wisdom, which proceeds from a literal weight of brain, and muddiness of understanding. Mistakes of the same kind are frequently made in forming a judgment of books as well as men. Those which profess a formal design to instruct and reform, and carry on the work methodically till the reader is lulled into repose, have passed for deep and useful performances; while others, replete with original observation and real instruction, have been treated as frivolous, because they are written in a familiar style, and the precepts conveyed in a sprightly and indirect manner.

Works which are composed with the laborious desire of being thought profound, have so very often the misfortune to be dull, that some people have considered the two terms as synonymous; and the men who receive it as a rule, that one set of books are profound because they are dull, may naturally conclude that others are superficial because

they are entertaining. With respect to books, however, matters are soon set to rights; those of puffed and false pretensions die neglected, while those of real merit live and flourish. But with regard to the men, the catastrophe is often different; we daily see formal assuming blockheads flourish and enjoy the fruits of their pompous impositions, while many men of talents who disdain such arts, live in obscurity, and die neglected. I ask your pardon, I have just recollected that I was giving you some account of Basil.

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The library here is much esteemed.-It is reckoned particularly rich in manuscripts. They showed us one of a Greek New Testament, with which you may believe Harvey and I were greatly edified.

a thousand years old.

At the arsenal is shown the

We are told it is above

armour in which Charles That unfortunate prince

duke of Burgundy was killed. has ornamented all the arsenals in Switzerland with trophies.

We visited the hall where the famous council sat so many years, and voted so intrepidly against the Pope. Not satisfied with condemning his conduct, they actually damned him in effigy. A famous painting, in the townhouse, is supposed to have been executed under their auspices. In this piece the devil is represented driving the Pope and several ecclesiastics before him to hell.-Why they should suppose the devil should be so very active against his holiness, I know no reason.

Here are many pictures of Hans Holben's (who was a native of Basil, and the favourite painter of Henry VIII, to whom he was first recommended by Erasmus); particularly, several portraits of Erasmus, and one sketch of Sir Thomas More's family. Though portraits are in general the most insipid of all kinds of paintings, yet those of such celebrated persons, done by such a painter, are certainly very interesting pieces.

The most admired of all Holben's works, is a suit of small pieces in different compartments, representing the

passion and sufferings of our Saviour. In these the colours remain with wonderful vivacity.

We were also conducted to the dismal gallery, upon whose walls, what is called Holben's Death's Dance is represented. The colours having been long exposed to the air, are now quite faded, which I can scarce think is much to be regretted, for the plan of the piece is so wretched, that the finest execution could hardly prevent it from giving disgust.

A skeleton, which represents Death, leads off in a dancing attitude, people of both sexes, of all ages, and of every condition, from the emperor to the beggar. All of them display the greatest unwillingness to accompany their hideous partner, who, regardless of tears, expostulations, and bribes, draws them along.

You will take notice, that there is a Death for each character, which occasions a nauseous repetition of the same figure; and the reluctance marked by the different people who are forced to this hated minuet, is in some accompanied with grimaces so very ridiculous, that one cannot refrain from smiling; which surely is not the effect the painter intended to produce.-If he did, of all the contrivances that ever were thought of to put people in goodhumour, his must be allowed the most extraordinary.

To this piece, such as it is, Prior alludes in his ode to the memory of Colonel Villers.

Nor aw'd by foresight, nor misled by chance,

Imperious Death directs his ebon lance,

Peoples great Henry's tomb, and leads up Holben's dance.

In this city all the clocks are about an hour advanced. When it is but one o'clock in all the towns and villages around, it is exactly two at Basil. This singularity is of three or four hundred years standing; and what is as singular as the custom itself, the origin of it is not known. This is plain, by their giving quite different accounts of it.

The most popular story is, that, about four hundred years ago, the city was threatened with an assault by sur

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